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A funny joke consists of:

  • A premise P that, for maximum humor, should be in some way familiar or relatable
  • A conclusion Q, that in some way involves injury, harm, embarrassment, or some other taboo
  • A "childlike" way to heuristically infer Q from P, which we may symbolize P ⊢ Q. A sensible adult would normally not conclude Q from P, but the joke does so perhaps by neglecting some common-sense information, or reasoning in a way different from usual, yet still partly justified by some aspect of P.
  • An element of surprise in the inference, where the crucial part of P ⊢ Q was not anticipated, even as a possibility, by the listener. In some real-life cases it is conceivable that P caused Q in actual physical fact, but P ⊢ Q should still not be what a sensible adult would expect to happen.

Is this "childlike inference" theory of humor associated with a philosopher who states it in approximately these terms?

causative
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    This seems to be about *jokes* specifically, not humor in general, or am I mistaken here? Humor involves a lot more than just telling funny stories, doesn't it? – Philip Klöcking Apr 12 '21 at 20:41
  • It doesn't sound mainstream, maybe could say is a mix of the superiority+incongruity theories of humour? https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/humor/ Humour makes more sense as play, indicated by queues, and what is otherwise uncomfortable can be explored eg real vs stated feelings. Satire and 'putting people in their place' in an appropriate creative entertaining way, are socially useful & require substantial intelligence & sensitivity, discussed here https://philosophy.stackexchange.com/questions/81070/what-are-some-arguments-against-insulting-being-illegal/81077#81077 – CriglCragl Apr 12 '21 at 22:07
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    I've only skimmed it but I think *Inside Jokes* by Daniel Dennett, Matthew Hurley, and Reginald Adams may have a similar idea. They add an evo-psych theory that it's an adaptation to help with correcting errors in our mental heuristics, and to motivate this debugging, nature "has to bribe the brain with pleasure. That is why we experience mirthful delight when we catch ourselves wrong-footed by a concealed inference error." So even if the evo-psych explanation is wrong it seems like they are focused on "inference error". Elsewhere they talk about why errors involving danger are funnier. – Hypnosifl Apr 12 '21 at 22:20
  • @Hypnosifl that does sound related. Have they stated it all together, the familiarity + surprising childlike inference + taboo, as necessary and sufficient? – causative Apr 13 '21 at 00:30
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    As I said I only skimmed it, but I didn't see them say those elements are all necessary. Do you think taboo is really needed though? There's a lot of absurdist humor that usually does seem to involve setting up some more familiar expectations and subverting them with something surprising that has its own kind of bizarro logic, but which doesn't seem to involve any particular taboo violations, like a lot of the jokes from Monty Python, or [Steven Wright one-liners](https://spot.colorado.edu/~huemer/wright.htm). – Hypnosifl Apr 13 '21 at 03:55
  • @Hypnosifl Many of those Stephen Wright jokes do involve taboo or harm, e.g. taking an amputee's shoes or someone wishing he was on earth (implying that either the postcard sender was dumb, or Stephen Wright has his head in the clouds, or both). Those that don't clearly involve harm/taboo tend not to be as funny, but one can argue that the subversion of expectation in the milder jokes is itself slightly taboo and that the humor depends on this breaking of social expectation. Taboo and familiarity are joke amplifiers. – causative Apr 13 '21 at 04:02
  • I agree funny jokes *usually* involve taboo violation but if you expand the concept of taboo violation wide enough to include any subverting of expectations--including, say, "Cross country skiing is great if you live in a small country"--then it seems redundant. Isn't subverting expectations already implied by a familiar setup followed by "silly" inference? Maybe implicit in that joke is the vision of a confused character trying to ski across a whole country, so there could be the taboo of laughing at another's dimwittedness, but again that would seem to cover any child-like mistake. – Hypnosifl Apr 13 '21 at 04:21
  • @Hypnosifl Yes, there is some hint of taboo/harm in the skiing one. The taboo is necessary to distinguish jokes from simple misunderstandings. Compare "I used to work in a fire hydrant factory. You couldn't park anywhere near the place." vs "I used to work in a trash can factory. It sure was clean!" The second one is a lot less funny, if it could be called funny at all, even though it relies on the same conflation of producing a product vs. using the product. It's not funny because things being clean and well-organized is not funny. Funny is when things fall apart. – causative Apr 13 '21 at 04:39
  • Yes, that's a good example--I think I see what you mean, but I would probably use a term like "negative emotion" (including minor irritations like the frustration of not finding a parking space) rather than "taboo", since I associate the latter with specific cultural taboos like body functions or death. It also seems to me that humor has this in common with forms of play like play-fighting or play-chasing that can be seen in young kids that don't really understand jokes, and in animals as well--a "safe" version of situations that in a non-play contest would involve stronger fear or aggression. – Hypnosifl Apr 13 '21 at 19:48
  • @Hypnosifl I might even speculate that the purpose of humor is to *suppress* learning in cases where we'd be learning incorrect and/or socially taboo heuristics. When we see that Q follows from P we might ordinarily tend to learn P ⊢ Q as a heuristic. But if P ⊢ Q is "childlike" (e.g. based on incomplete/misinterpreted information) and Q is taboo/harm/embarrassment/etc, or emotionally negative as you might say, then we don't want to adopt P ⊢ Q as part of our serious model of the world. So we laugh instead. (We may also learn from some jokes, as the suppression is not total). – causative Apr 13 '21 at 21:45

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Sounds like this kind of joking inference belongs to informal fallacy. Is Argument from analogy matching your expectation?

Electrons in an atom orbit a nucleus, and electrons jump instantly from orbit to orbit. Therefore, planets in a solar system jump instantly from orbit to orbit.

Double Knot
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  • Well, that's kind of an example. I would say literally any joke is an example of childlike inference. In this case the "joke" about planets could be made funnier by making the rather austere premise ("planets in space") more familiar and relatable, by making the consequences more socially taboo, and by setting up the premise so that it's more understandable how someone could make that mistake with childlike thinking. – causative Apr 12 '21 at 23:36
  • For instance, take: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/3c/da/c9/3cdac9f3348cd7c7720b920ff2bca7d9.jpg The premise P is familiar: one guy has asked another whether his dog bites, and the dog owner said no, and the first guy presumably tried to pet the dog. The result Q, that the guy on the right was kicked by the dog, certainly involves harm. The inference P ⊢ Q is understandable under the idea that "another thing dangerous animals can do is kick," which is of course childish logic when applied to dogs. – causative Apr 12 '21 at 23:39
  • Here's a way the planets one could be made a little bit funny: say that you are watching a science cartoon where an anthropomorphized electron ("Lenny the electron") is showing you the universe at different scales. Previously he demonstrated how he jumps among orbits in the atom. Then later he's scaled himself up to the size of a planet, and does the same orbit-jumping thing, bumping into an anthropomorphized planet who is very annoyed. "Hey buddy, watch it!" "Oops, sorry, things are different where I come from." Little bit funny. – causative Apr 12 '21 at 23:47
  • The anthropomorphizing makes it more relatable, and there's social embarrassment in the conclusion, and it's more understandable how the electron could make that mistake with childlike logic (because that's how things are done where he's from). – causative Apr 12 '21 at 23:49
  • @causative I wouldn't say literally any joke is an example of childlike inference, many jokes are caused by a pun (like informal equivocation fallacy). Such as "Light travels faster than sound. That's why some people appear bright until you hear them speak". – Double Knot Apr 13 '21 at 02:00
  • That's a perfect example of childlike inference. Familiar premise P: "Light travels faster than sound." Conclusion Q involving harm/taboo: "(some) people are stupid." Childlike way to conclude Q from P: inappropriately apply the idea about light and sound, to "brightness" (intellectual) and speech. A pun - an inappropriate way of using words - is essentially always an example of childlike, incorrect inference, and it becomes a joke when the conclusion is taboo and the premise is familiar. – causative Apr 13 '21 at 02:13